There’s good snow in the mountains, and I know that from personal experience, not just the pass cams.
Kari with the 6-month-olds, Elena and Sage
Powder
Posted by julie on Tuesday, 10 March 2009, 0:25Bathroom Update: Psych!
Posted by julie on Thursday, 5 March 2009, 22:29You’d think I’d learn. Of course it will take longer than I’d hoped. The tub and sink are in place and waterfied. The showerheads are also hooked up, but not affixed to bars on the wall yet. No toilet.
But, luckily, I have cute children. So, Babies in a Basket!
Sylvan in a laundry basket, five months old.
Elena in a laundry basket at six months old. Note her signature tongue flip.
Sylvan has the "shh" sound effects covered.
It Almost Looks Like a Bathroom!
Posted by julie on Wednesday, 4 March 2009, 23:41For you dog lovers, or perhaps for the dog haters, you really have to check out Bizkit. I don’t know her, but she’s been making me laugh.
Now for a bathroom update. We moved back into our fantastic house last October, after five bearable but long months away (we really love this house). Tomorrow (I’m crossing my fingers), we’ll have an upstairs bathroom again. Our previous upstairs bath was completely demolished to make my office during the remodel (which may be why the bathtub has lived in my office for the last five months). We decided to move the bathroom to the north side of the house, since it just seemed wasteful to take up valuable southern exposure on a bathroom.
Here’s a little pictorial timeline of our second-floor bathroom:
Looking out bathroom windows, 23 July 2008
Looking into the bathroom October 12, when we moved back in. The tub moved from here to my office so we could tile the floor.
Bathroom as it looked this morning. Chris tiled the floor in November, and Tony the Tiler did the tub surround last week.
This morning.
Yippee! By this evening we'd gained a sink and a tub and baseboards.
Your bathtub is on a carpet scrap, right?
Looking through the shower to the bedroom, 23 July 2008
Looking into shower this morning. Note the shelves, glass tiles for accent, and funky floor tiling.
Thanks to all those who helped make this bathroom become the well-built, brightly-colored, tiled wonderland it is today.
Little Ears and Furry Ears
Posted by julie on Tuesday, 3 March 2009, 0:51Last night I tried making pasta for the first time. No, not boiling up spirals. Making pasta. It was remarkably easy, but the results were less than stellar. May I recommend making your orechiette thinner than mine, more like these lovely, delicate ones resembling seashells? And boil them longer than one minute after they float to the top, regardless of what your recipe says. And have your husband come in and try them before you stop boiling them, too. But do flavor them with garlicky olive oil, garlic, toasted hazelnuts, broccoli, salt, and asiago. Then, even if they are thick and mealy, you can smile through your garlic breath.
Orechiette
This afternoon, Tephra and I shared 30 minutes of uninterrupted sunshine when Elena’s and Sylvan’s naps overlapped. I enjoyed a cold drink, Tephra enjoyed the smell of spring, and I read quite a few pages in Jhumpa Lahiri’s Interpreter of Maladies. And I wore a T-shirt and jeans. Bare feet and arms – spring must be around the corner (where was winter?).
Tephra mid-meow
View from my window, 2/25
Posted by julie on Sunday, 1 March 2009, 23:54It rained nearly an inch last Wednesday, which accounted for over one-fifth of February’s rainfall. It poured. Last Sunday, Sylvan told Brenna, his babysitter (as they were outside having a dinner picnic on the front porch; cute, huh?), that this was “Oregon rain.” But Wednesday, it was more like afternoon-in-the-mountains rain, minus the thunder. Or at least it rained that hard every time I set foot outside.
Sylvan and I snapped a few photos while Elena stared out at the splashing puddles. The real reason I took these is to show Dad the state of our back “path.” He has gamely agreed to work on a brick and paver path when he’s here in a few weeks. There are some drainage issues. And some mud.
From nearest the gate (west) to nearest the house:
The gate and the puddle
The existing "path"
The pavers, pool, and non-muddy walk to the garage
The ankle-grabbing hole at stairs' end
Still up for it, Dad? You could take on the garden if you prefer, but, boy, I’m not sure you want to see those photos.
Camilla’s 5th birthday party
Posted by jonesey on Sunday, 1 March 2009, 10:47Yesterday, Sylvan went to Camilla’s 5th birthday party at Bounce Gymnastics.
Camilla is a friend of Sylvan’s, from his school.
Follow the link above for cute pictures of Sylvan with tons and tons of girls (he was the only boy at the party other than Camilla’s brother). Also, a bonus picture of Elena!
Fierce Love
Posted by julie on Saturday, 28 February 2009, 23:03My friend and mentor, Debra Gwartney, recently published a memoir, Live Through This, about a terrifying stretch of time in the mid-90s when her two older daughters, then in high school and middle school, ran away first for a few nights at a time and later for months. Debra’s finishing up a book tour, and she read in Eugene the other night. After her daughter Amanda’s moving introduction and Debra’s heartbreaking reading, Debra mentioned, while answering a question, that Amanda and Stephanie are both superbly creative, intelligent women. A family friend told her that they had needed to express their creativity somehow; they couldn’t have just sat home and done their homework, essentially. Debra wishes she’d known how to channel that energy.
It scared me a bit, both the reading and this comment. I mean, Debra’s sometimes discouraging but ultimately family-strengthening experience could put the fear of daughters into any red-blooded parent. But that comment about smart teenagers scared me even more. I think I have at least one of those children – those creative, brilliant ones.
And I’m not like that. While I have some artistic talents, it’s more in the execution of an idea, not in the development of said idea. I sat home and did my homework when I was in high school. I wasn’t full of passion and creative energy and spirit. Sylvan might be.
I’m started the channeling of his creative energy right now. We’re working on cutting and collages.
Tonight, Sylvan pulled himself onto my lap and told me that he loves me. Unsolicited. Some people might not have to wait nearly 3 1/2 years for that. Debra might have waited longer.
Happy Birthday, Elena: 6 Months
Posted by julie on Monday, 16 February 2009, 1:01
Dear Elena,
Whew, it seems like more than half a year ago that we were living in the “summer house” when I went into labor after that Market of Choice chocolate cake (that’s three Moms I know for whom it’s worked; we’ll have to work on their marketing of this particular baked good).
A short list of highlights from the last month, along with a slew of photos:
- You started to eat food.
- You started to feed yourself with a spoon (today), a mere ten days after we started feeding you. I guess you really like lentils.
Lentils and applesauce. Who needs pudding?
- You’re so close to crawling. You roll around, pretty effortlessly getting where you want to go – to touch a toy, see the fire in the wood stove, bonk your head on the stairs, get stuck under a chair. You’ve been lifting up into a plank for a few weeks, and you’ve recently started to lift your butt even higher, into a modified downward dog. Just today, I saw you get on all fours, into the crawling position.
Working on the crawl
- You went snowshoeing last weekend.
- You’re continually amused and entertained by your brother, who loves you and also likes to make loud noises that make you cry. He’s still learning about cause and effect. I’m sorry you’re his newest guinea pig.
Sylvan digs the great-tailed grackle
- You’re completely done crying just because you’re in the car.
- You weathered your six-month shots like a champ.
- If you’re crying for a reason other than sleepiness, pain, or hunger, the Itsy-Bitsy Spider almost always turns you around.
I love you,
Mommy
Sylvan took 121 pictures in 12 minutes. Here's one.
And another
There's more than one truck lover in this family
"Power hair," as Sylvan calls it. Maybe Gramma Diana said something about static electricity?
41 Months: Through Sylvan’s Eyes
Posted by julie on Thursday, 12 February 2009, 9:31
And check out Sylvan on Oregon Wild’s website. Chandra invited us to join an Oregon Wild snowshoe to Fish Lake last weekend, and she blogged about it on their website, so I needn’t.
And did anyone know that a crumb-saster is “a disaster where crumbs fall all over you”?
Elena Eats
Posted by julie on Wednesday, 11 February 2009, 23:54Elena eats rice cereal! Mixed with breast milk. (For those of you who think I might stand over the rice cereal and milk myself like you would a goat, I’ll clear things up: Breast pumps attach very much like dairy milking pumps, I fill up bottles, then I freeze the milk in ice cube trays to be used if I’m gone or if we want to make rice cereal more palatable and nutritious. Yes, I feel like Bessie, but no, there’s no standing over a milking pail in the kitchen.)
Mmm, when can I try chocolate mousse?
For the past few weeks, Elena has wanted more milk than usual. And, if Chris or I try to eat while she’s on our laps, she follows the food with her eyes, looking longingly as it disappears into our mouths. In order to do this, she drops her 10-pound noggin so it’s leaning on her back as she peers up at us, eyes imploring us to give her pizza or chili or pancakes. So, we’ve started to give her “solid” food.
Self-esteem boosting bib courtesy of Aunt Jenn
Elena digs rice cereal, but the plain applesauce? Um, it’s a little strong and strange. Right, I’d forgotten that she’d never had anything but breastmilk and rice cereal – oh, and the bits of spaghetti with pesto, bread, and probably cashews that Chris sneaks into her little mouth when I’m not looking.